


I Don't Deserve You

by mercyziegler



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Anxiety Attacks, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Coming Out, Depression, Fighting, Fluff and Angst, Gay Keith (Voltron), I love them so much, Keith (Voltron) is Bad at Feelings, Lance (Voltron) is a Mess, M/M, Season 3, klance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-09
Updated: 2018-07-09
Packaged: 2019-06-07 20:34:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15227358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercyziegler/pseuds/mercyziegler
Summary: “What’s the point, Keith?” he finally found some words to say out loud. “Why are you wasting your time pitying on me if when you turn your back you’re going to act like nothing happened? You need my apologies so much? ‘I forgive you. Thanks for the truth.’ There. Now go and live your life like nothing’s ever happened, the way you’ve always wanted.”“No! Lance, that was not the truth! I just didn’t wanna tell Allura the real truth. I was scared…”“Scared? So you were scared to tell Allura you were gay but you were never scared of hurting my feelings?”





	I Don't Deserve You

“Good morning, sleepyhead” Keith whispered, giving Lance a little kiss on his nose.  
“Hey…” Lance answered after a long yawn.  
They both smiled and kissed again. Keith got up, wearing just sweat pants, leaving his nude back free for Lance to appreciate, before getting up too. This morning was not different from any other since they decided to be a couple.  
But, well, nobody knew about that.  
They left the room and while Lance headed to his room to change his clothes, Keith was ready for breakfast.  
The taller boy was always confused this time of the day, when he was alone for a few minutes. He knew Keith was afraid of coming out, that he thought the crew was going to start treating him differently and he had a lot of responsibilities now he was the leader of Voltron, so Lance didn’t want this to be a problem for him. He stood quiet, sneaking out of his room and knocking on Keith’s door at night, like he was breaking the law, so they could cuddle and make out.  
He knew all of that, but he didn’t like it. Not even a bit.  
‘What was the big deal, after all? He is gay, so what? Everyone on the castle is his friend and loves him, nobody is going to treat him differently just because he is in love with me!’  
And every thought always ended up in: ‘is he really in love with me?’  
Because nobody is ashamed of who they love, right? When you love someone you want to scream for the whole world that they mean everything to you and there’s no way he could hide it so well.  
Lance surely couldn’t. These past days he lost count on how many ‘you’re acting weird’, ‘are you okay?’ and ‘why are you looking at Keith like that?’ he had heard. He always had to lie, lie to his own friends he was in love with his boyfriend. Something was clearly wrong about that.  
He left his room with the same smile he showed every single day, heading to the kitchen to make himself a coffee and join everyone in the control room. Today was going to be a big day, he thought.  
“Good morning, everyone! Honestly, I don’t know how we can call it a ‘morning’ since everything is always dark out there”  
“Lance, don’t bother to play the smart one after you just woke up, it does not suit you” Pidge said sipping a coffee, not even looking away from her screen.  
Everyone giggled. “Good morning, Lance” Allura responded, cute as always.  
“Good morning, princess” Lance got closer and kissed her hand.  
“Wow, someone’s in a good mood today” Hunk said from his seat, analyzing his Cuban friend.  
“And have you ever seen me in a bad mood, buddy?”  
“Uhm, yeah? Every time Keith does something better than you. So, yeah, a lot”  
Lance glanced at Keith, who did the same but didn’t say anything.  
Usually Lance would argue back and tease Keith until he got mad at him, but he couldn’t do that anymore; not even since they first kissed some weeks ago, when Lance had a problem with Red and Keith had to go there and calm both of them down. They shared a lot of intimate moments since that day, intimate conversations… and they shared a secret. A secret that was tearing Lance apart.  
So, completely ignoring Hunk’s comment, he turned to Coran. “So what are we gonna do today? Training? Fighting the Galra? Bonding with our lions? Just chill? I’m up for anything!”  
Lance looked over his shoulder and saw Hunk shrugging to Pidge, who did the same. He didn’t know how to lie. Keith, otherwise, hided his feelings as easily as he hided that knife of his.

 

Coran didn’t gave them much to do. They were planning a huge attack on a Galra convoy but things needed some time to get ready, they couldn’t take any risks. Hunk and Pidge were working on improving that Galra finder of theirs, Allura was on an intense training routine, Keith usually spent some hours away from the Castle, looking for Shiro, and Lance… in these kind of days he just had to improvise.  
He joined Allura in her morning training; but they didn’t say a word. She was focused as he was never going to be, he envied her strength and talent on everything she did. In a good way, of course. After two hours he stopped and took a long shower, singing and dancing his worries away.  
It was only midday Earth-time and Lance was dying of boredom while walking around the Castle. In times like these he began to think if he was really necessary in the team. ‘If Shiro comes back, what is going to be my purpose? Keith is going to get his lion back and Allura had a bond with Blue even bigger than mine by now… what even is the point of me?’ his mind was racing.  
Suddenly he heard Keith’s voice in the Black Lion’s lodge, he was yelling at someone.  
“Why are you even asking me this? How could it be important right now?”  
Allura’s voice softly responded, “I’m just worried about you both, Keith. You and Lance seem to have been troubled and the problem is just with both of you. I know how worried you are about Shiro, we all are… but Lance seems to be more worried about you. The way he looks at you… something’s different.”  
Lance hid in a gap, behind the doors of the lodge.  
“Is there something you wanna tell me, Keith?” Allura continued.  
“No, Allura. There’s nothing I wanna tell you”.  
“Are you not worried about Lance?”  
He hesitated. “Lance is fine…”  
Allura sighed, “come here, Keith”.  
Things went silent for a tick and Lance couldn’t help but giving a quick peek in their direction. They were sitting in the opened ramp of the Black Lion. The volume of their voices way lower.  
“I think you’re missing something way more important than you can imagine here” Allura continued.  
“Like what?”  
“Haven’t you noticed Lance is treating you differently? Being careful with his words, smiling whenever you say something smart, looking softly at you when you’re not looking…”  
“What’s your point, Allura?”  
“My point is… I think he likes you, Keith”.  
No sound came out of his mouth.  
“I’ve been noticing you two and I’ve been worried because you seem to be hiding something. You know it’s not healthy for us as a team to have secrets. So… do you have something to tell me, Keith?”  
Silence. Again.  
“Are you and Lance… together?”  
This time his voice was loud and clear. “No! Allura, how can you jump into such… absurd conclusions? Let it go! Lance is fine, I’m fine and we’re not… together. This’s never going to happen! Forget this!”  
Lance froze. His voice seemed so convicted, like nothing was really happening. Like they were never going to happen. His heart started to race and his breath getting heavier. He heard footsteps coming in his direction. His insecurities were not in vain, after all. ‘Now it all makes sense. He was ashamed of me this whole time. Why did I think he liked me as much I did? This is never going to happen to you, Lance. Nobody is ever going to love you. Nobody… never…’ his mind was racing.  
He was sitting on the ground with his back on the door when Keith walked past him, Allura right behind.  
“Lance?” the princess noticed him.  
Keith turned, watching the same scene Allura was. A lost boy, shrunken in the corner with tears in his eyes.  
"Lance…” Keith softly said, slowly walking closer to him.  
“Leave me alone” was the only thing Lance was able to say, before getting up and run, chocking in his own tears that were rolling down his face even faster than his feet against the ground.  
Suddenly everything went quiet and all he could listen was his thoughts, screaming at him. ‘You’re useless, Lance. Nobody cares. Specially Keith. Keith wouldn’t care if you died right now. Anything is more important to him than you. He does not need you. Nobody does’. Like a defense mechanism, memories of the time Keith and Lance used to spend together crossed his mind. His smell, the way his hair felt between his finger, the constant rhythm of their heartbeats while they kissed…  
‘But it doesn’t matter. He didn’t love you back then, he still doesn’t love you. He is never going to love you’.  
Lance was lost. Not just inside that huge Castle, but inside himself. He looked around, seeing nothing but corridors with countless rooms. No one in sight. That was when he gave up. He fell on the ground, hitting his head on the wall behind him. And holding his legs against him, he cried. His breath was heavy, his lungs hurting, his head crushing him from the inside out.  
He couldn’t remember the last time he felt so sad, so broken. Suddenly everything came back to him. It was not just Keith. He missed home, he missed his family, his mom’s hugs, his sister, his brothers, his gradma. He missed the way the stars looked from the roof of his house, the sound of the sea, of the rain… Now he was alone in the cold and darkness of space.  
And nobody loved him there.  
Nobody cared.  
He would do anything to just cease his existence in that moment. ‘Your family is probably better off without you. Why would they like to have you around? Why would anyone like having you around? You’re useless, annoying, stupid… you just can’t do anything right. There’s no place in this world for you’ Lance’s mind kept torturing him.  
He couldn’t bare it. He put his two hands in his ears, trying to block the thoughts. Trying to make the pain go away, because it just hurt too much.  
The hiccups and loud sobbing didn’t allow him to hear someone arriving, when he looked up it was too late to run. Keith was right in front of him.  
“Lance, please. Listen to me”  
“Get out”, he whispered with his stuffy-nose voice.  
“Lance, please…” Keith was kneeling in front of him, gently touching his tear-wet hands.  
He pulled his hands against him and buried his head on the gap between his knees. It was too painful looking at his face.  
“Lance, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that. I am sad and angry because… I’m probably never going to see Shiro again… and he was the only family I had. I got carried away by the feeling and didn’t think in how it would affect you. I was selfish, like I always am. Please, don’t cry. I’m sorry… please, don’t cry…” his voice began to break.  
It took Lance a few seconds to look up. Keith was still in his knees, with his head in the same height as his. He looked up to stare at Lance’s eyes, but the taller boy broke the look.  
“I’ve never wanted to hurt you…” Keith whispered.  
“What’s the point, Keith?” he finally found some words to say out loud. “Why are you wasting your time pitying on me if when you turn your back you’re going to act like nothing happened? You need my apologies so much? ‘I forgive you. Thanks for the truth.’ There. Now go and live your life like nothing’s ever happened, the way you’ve always wanted.”  
“No! Lance, that was not the truth! I just didn’t wanna tell Allura the real truth. I was scared…”  
“Scared? So you were scared to tell Allura you were gay but you were never scared of hurting my feelings?”  
Keith froze.  
“You really are selfish…” Lance whispered, cleaning the last tears that were rolling down his face and slowly walking along the corridor.  
“You’re right.” He stopped, hearing Keith’s stuffy voice. “I am selfish. And I don’t deserve you”.  
Lance kept going and didn’t look back. 

 

His room was cold, but that might just be what Lance needed. He picked up his blanket and rolled himself in it like a burrito. He had to get over this.  
“Come on, Lance. You’ve been rejected before, no biggie! People just don’t see how amazing you are, that’s all! It’s their loss!” his voice sounded convinced for a minute, but his smile didn’t last long. His mind was fighting bravely against the words he was saying. “I’ve never liked him anyways…”  
He almost couldn’t finish the sentence. That was going to be harder than he thought.

 

‘Perhaps that Earthly Space Mall’s store had something useful after all’, Lance thought when he found and iPod with headphones plugged in it he had bought a while ago, but never used. He turned it on and laid on his bed, under his blanket, all cozy.  
“Of course that guy didn’t bother to steal an iPod with cool songs. I bet this was in Kaltenecker’s stomach” he buffed, scrolling through all types of country songs his world had.  
That would have to do; he had to distract himself. He could even laugh at this situation, couldn’t he?  
He tried a smile, but it didn’t come out.  
He lost track of time and was even beginning to enjoy the songs, when someone knocked the door really hard, like they were knocking for hours before he heard it. He took off his phones.  
“Lance, open this door! I know you’re in there!” It was Hunk.  
“What do you want?”  
“What do I- Lance, just open it already! What the hell are you doing?”  
He ran out of his bed and put his iPod in the same place it was before. “I’m… just chilling”.  
“Lance, I swear to god…”  
“Okay! Okay, I’m coming!”  
Lance gave himself a quick look in the mirror. He looked awful, but that was nothing he could do to fix that right now. He would have to improvise.  
The door opened and Hunk came in, closing it behind him.  
“So, what do you want?” Lance was standing in a perfect posture. Hugging his hands behind his back and swinging back and forth.  
“First of all: are you okay?” Hunk held Lance’s shoulders, giving him an intimidating look.  
“Uhm, yeah”, he gently escaped from his friends hands and sit on the bed. “Why wouldn’t I be?”  
“Uh, because you don’t look okay at all? Plus… Keith kinda… told us everything”.  
“WHAT?” Lance screamed, jumping out of the bed in the same instant. “W-HOW-WHAT?” another scream.  
“Okay, I need you to calm down”, Hunk held Lance’s shoulders and forced him to sit on the bed again. “I don’t know what you’re thinking he told us exactly, but I need you to calm down so I can tell you”.  
He took a deep breath, trying to clear his mind. So, Hunk began to explain.  
“Some minutes ago, Keith said he had something important to say and that we all had to group up in the lounging room. I said we had to wait for you, but he said you wouldn’t come. He was so nervous, trembling like I’ve never seen Keith do… we began to get worried that something happened to you, until he finally spoke. He said he had just made something he was not proud of, that he had screwed up and that he felt like the worst person on the galaxy. That was the moment we all thought ‘yup, he killed Lance’ and trust me that would have been way easier to believe than what he said after. He told us you two kissed that time Red got stuck because she didn’t wanna respond to you, and that since then you were… together. He told us with the dumbest smile in his face that you had to sneak out of your room to go to his every night, and even that one night you forgot which room was his and you kept knocking and yelling at the wrong door until Keith got out to look for you. We didn’t laugh at the time because we were obviously too chocked to do so, but thinking about it right now”, Hunk chuckled. “It must have been pretty funny… ANYWAYS, he said he didn’t want to tell us because he was afraid of what we might think of him, and that at first you were okay with it but after some time you were clearly not, but he ignored because he is ‘a selfish piece of shit’. His words, not mine. And finally, he told us what he told Allura and that you heard it and that it broke his heart to bits when he saw you cry.”  
Lance was completely paralyzed. He couldn’t speak, neither move. That was just… too much.  
Hunk continued. “He said he had gone too far, that nothing could ever justify what he had done to you” he looked into Lance’s eyes until he reciprocated the look. “He said that was not something you do to someone you love.”  
Lance’s eyes widened and he looked to the ground again, both hands in his head. He couldn’t imagine Keith doing such thing. Not just telling everyone nice things about him and that they were together, but saying he… loved him. He had never told him that directly, neither did Lance. But apparently he did it all and did it alone. Lance didn’t think he would have the guts to be so serious about this subject in front of everyone without Keith by his side.  
“He said he was a horrible person and that we should not forgive him. That we should totally forget about him when he was not needed in any mission and that he didn’t deserve any of us… specially you. Than he went to his room I guess. I’ve been trying to digest all of this yet, but I had to see if you were doing okay. If what he said is true… you must be shattered.”  
The skinny boy looked at his caring friend’s eyes, trying to think of something to say. He didn’t know how to feel about that. Keith had just made him have possibly the worst anxiety attack of his life and now he had just fixed everything. That’s what Lance always wanted to happen and even more. He opened up to his friends, told them the truth, spoke his feelings… and he was not ashamed of Lance anymore, but he was ashamed of himself.  
“Hunk, do you think he… do you really think he meant it?”  
Their eyes met again. “I do, bud. I think he was being as honest as someone could be.”  
Lance smiled. “Thanks, buddy” he whispered, giving Hunk a clumsy hug before leaving the room.  
He stopped in front of Keith’s door and silently took a deep breath, before knocking.  
“Who is it?” a stuffy voice asked from inside the room. Lance tried to answer but nothing came out of his mouth, that’s when he looked down and realized he was trembling.  
Without asking again, Keith opened the door, freezing in the exact moment he saw Lance’s face. Their eyes met and stagnated. Nobody said a word for who knows how long, but Lance was able to break the silence.  
“C-Can I come in?”  
Keith took a step aside and gestured with his hand, instructing him to enter. The door closed behind them and the air felt so heavy they thought about putting their space suits on.  
“Why did you do that?” Lance asked, almost whispering. Both were looking at the ground.  
“I… I just had to. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I just ignored everything. I crossed every line I could ever cross when I told Allura that... I was wrong since the beginning and they needed to know that.”  
Lance glanced at him, every good feeling coming back bit by bit whenever he looked at his face. Keith never looked so… vulnerable. Lance was trying to imagine how he felt when he saw him crying in that hallway, what he thought when he realized he was the reason of so much pain…  
The taller boy made his way to the one in front of him, slowly grabbing his hand. Their eyes met and a shy smile appeared in Lance’s face. “We both know you screwed up… and that really hurt me”. Keith looked at the ground again, but his head was pulled back up so they could look in each other’s eyes again, “but you proved to me you are not that person. You had a lot in your head and I was never completely honest with you about my feelings either. I should have told you I wanted us to be official, that I was not going to hide anything, that I was sure you didn’t love me because you never showed you did… until now.”  
Keith smiled for a fraction of a second, then laid his head on Lance’s hand, like a puppy that was pulled away from his mom. Lance took a step closer and pulled the small boy’s face closer to his own. “What about we try to forget this ever happened and start it all over again?”  
“Lance, you can’t just ignore all this time I’ve made you feel bad. Now you know the kind of person I can become and I don’t want this for you… You deserve so much more than--”  
He was interrupted by a lovely and passionate kiss that came out of nowhere. Lance held his waist with his free hand and continued to hold his face with the other. Keith couldn’t move, he was… shocked. In a good way. In the best way.  
A whisper came out of Lance’s mouth. “Please, don’t spoil our first kiss”.  
Their smiles were so genuine they almost had a sound effect. Keith finally was able to react, pulling his arms around Lance’s neck, who pulled him up until his feet left the ground. They walked blindly until reach the bed. And there they stayed.  
They were sure someone was going to show up if they needed them. But until then, all they needed were a bed, a blanket and each other’s arms.

**Author's Note:**

> And that's it! I hope you liked my (second) Klance fanfic. Don't be mad at me for making Lance suffer, I just wanted ya'll to see how much he is going through and wanting to hug him as much as I do :( ♥ See ya next time ♥


End file.
